Sensitivity to Melody, Rhythm, and Beat in Supporting Speech-in-Noise Perception in Young Adults.
Kathryn M Yates, David R Moore, Sygal Amitay and 1 others
PMID 29965864WHAT IT FOUND
Sensitivity to musical beat, but not melody or rhythm, strongly predicted better speech-in-noise perception in young adults.
This link remained significant even after accounting for working memory and frequency discrimination.
Key findings
01Beat sensitivity was a notably strong predictor for performance on the Matrix Sentence Test and remained so even after factoring out potentially relevant influences from auditory working memory and frequency discrimination.
02Rhythm and beat, but not melody, both associated positively with SRTs.
03The association between rhythm and SRT was considerably reduced after controlling for auditory working memory.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study used a correlational design, so causation cannot be inferred. The sample size was small (n = 24). One participant was removed as a bivariate outlier, reducing the effective sample size for correlations. The specific speech-in-noise test used (Matrix Sentence Test) may have enhanced the correlation with beat perception due to its design. Working memory was measured by combining forward and backward digit span, which may have added noise as these index different components.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that musical training causes better speech-in-noise perception. This was a correlational study, so while beat sensitivity is linked to better hearing in noise, this does not prove that training beat sensitivity will improve a patient's communication.